


though we've heard that hearts can still be wrong (something's telling me that you're the one)

by hearden



Series: ranger lovefest [1]
Category: Power Rangers, Power Rangers Megaforce
Genre: Alternate Universe - Beach, Alternate Universe - No Powers, F/F, Fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-16
Updated: 2017-08-16
Packaged: 2018-12-16 02:05:03
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,966
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11818941
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hearden/pseuds/hearden
Summary: In a series of seasons, Gia watches Emma come into and leave her life, over and over again.(aka the beachgoer/froyo vendor au that nobody asked for because it's giemma lovefest month)





	though we've heard that hearts can still be wrong (something's telling me that you're the one)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [kathillards](https://archiveofourown.org/users/kathillards/gifts), [mcmeekin](https://archiveofourown.org/users/mcmeekin/gifts), [advaevika](https://archiveofourown.org/users/advaevika/gifts).



> for @kimberlyannharts on tumblr as well as the rest of the hell clique even tho i don't know y'all because hell clique's content is how i was introduced to megaforce, and for that, i'm thankful
> 
> anyway i got this fic idea at like 2am and IMMEDIATELY stopped everything i was doing, sat down, and wrote some gays
> 
> that's the power of giemma, folks, and i don't even go here rip

_I'd rather crash, I'd rather crawl_

_Than never have your love at all_

 

~

 

In the summer after her first year of college, Gia picks up a job at Ernie's BrainFreeze to cash in and turn her abundance of free time into something productive while she takes an online summer class. (Juggling has always been one of her talents, anyway.)

It's a small, quaint, outdoor hangout on the pier overlooking Harwood Beach Park -- not so constantly bustling that she gets annoyed like anything deeper downtown, but with enough traffic that she makes good money for her effort. Summers are, foreseeably, the worst with all the beachgoers coming out of the woodwork and tourists cruising through town.

But, hey, she gets an employee discount regularly and, on a good day, free froyo, so it can't be all that bad.

 

* * *

 

A small part of her traffic comes from the lifeguards coming off of their shifts, and she always squints at them over whatever book she's reading whenever they come up to the counter. The amount of froyo she's seen Tori make vanish in her first week alone doesn't quite match up with the surfer body she has, but sure.

The rest of her customers are always tourists, students, or people hoping to motivate themselves into finally working for that summer bod they've wanted for years.

The last one usually never pans out, but Gia hasn't had proper time to make full observations.

Sometimes, people stop to chat with her. Sometimes, she indulges them if she's got nothing else to do. Mostly, she's not here looking for friends -- she has enough at university, and all of them are currently taking vacations anywhere else but here.

She never expected Emma Goodall, though.

 

* * *

 

Two months, two weeks, and one day into summer, Gia Moran meets the most beautiful girl on the planet.

It's most likely an exaggeration, but she finds herself losing her thoughts the moment a voice snaps her from her book, asking, "Hey, are you guys open right now?" and looks up to see bright, curious, brown eyes staring right back at her.

"Uh."

Gia is rarely speechless -- and she definitely wouldn't admit to being it _now._ No, she's simply… gathering her thoughts. Yes, that's it.

"Yeah, we're open, sorry," she says, taking in a breath and reminding herself to smile, "I was just distracted." She sets her book down next to her open notebook, full of angry scribbles about feminism and how she doesn't want to be taking this summer class but it's one of the few available.

The girl glances down at Gia's book on the counter and raises an eyebrow, "Oh, yeah, I've heard _Atlas Shrugged_ is great for light summer reading." She lets out a small laugh, and Gia's stomach flips.

"I've got a summer class," she explains, hastily closing her notebook, "So, what'll it be today?"

She watches the girl peruse the menu above her head, her nose adorably scrunched up in a deeply thoughtful manner, and thinks _Uh-oh._

"Hm," the girl taps a finger on her chin then smiles broadly, having decided what she wants -- she looks _proud_ , and oddly enough, Gia feels a rush of pride sweep through her body out of nowhere, "I'll have one low-fat, cherry berry strawberry with carob chips."

"Good choice. Coming right up. Your name?"

The girl glances around, her brow furrowed in confusion. "I'm the only one here right now," she says, tilting her head.

"It's just how things go," Gia says with a shrug. It is _not_ how things go -- but she's willing to change things up for a pretty face.

"Emma," and she decides right then that _Emma_ is one of her favorite names ever.

Gia turns to start on Emma's order, and that's when Emma adds an afterthought, "Oh! No hot fudge, please!"

She's glad her back is turned because she doesn't know how much her reputation would suffer if she let anyone -- _especially_ a stranger she just met -- see her grin from ear to ear.

 

* * *

 

Later, when she goes back to her apartment and resumes her criticism of Ayn Rand, at some point, her bookmark falls onto the floor. Gia's halfway to leaning as far as she can out of her chair to retrieve it without actually getting up when she notices writing on the back that hadn't been there before.

Curious, she picks it up and examines the delicate cursive on the back.

_Hey! I just wanted to tell you that you're really pretty. :) - Emma_

_(Also, sorry for stealing your bookmark!)_

Oh, she's in trouble.

 

* * *

 

Despite her best efforts, she only sees Emma one more time before summer ends.

This time, Emma comes with one, two, three, _four_ boys in tow, and Gia immediately thinks _Wow, how am I going to compete with that?_

She doesn't dwell on the fact that that was her first thought when she hasn't even known the girl for a full hour.

Emma and the boy who's wearing red go up to the counter while the boys in blue, black, and silver take off down the stretch of the beach, messing around and throwing sand at each other.

"This is Troy," Emma says, brightly smiling, and Gia briefly wonders if Emma does everything with a smile as radiant as that.

Troy gives her a short, playful salute then gets something for him and the other guys, efficiently stopping Gia from making any small talk with Emma while she busies herself with their orders.

However, when she's done, Troy nods a goodbye at Gia then tells Emma with a warm grin, "You know where our stuff is," and walks off with four frozen yogurts expertly balanced in his hands.

And, she's alone with Emma, who suddenly looks rather shy, preoccupied with looking at the book Gia has on the counter this time.

"I loved that movie," Emma says with a small smile, reaching over and tapping the cover of _Les Miserables._

Gia thinks about Eponine, Marius, and Cosette, how handsome Troy is, how she's stuck behind this counter for the rest of summer, and wonders which one she is.

"Yeah? I've got a bookmark in there, too, if you wanna write me a note," Gia teases, feeling utterly bold like the summer sun.

Emma ducks her head, blushing furiously, and rubs at her neck. "I was hoping you wouldn't see that," she mumbles, "But that makes no sense."

"I think you're pretty, too," Gia says, her voice heavy enough to mean something -- but not yet -- and light enough to be casual -- but not _too_ casual.

The wide grin Emma gives her will surely be the cause of death written on her gravestone.

 

* * *

 

She manages to find out that Emma, Troy, and their friends go to a university in the next town and that they pop over to Harwood for the beach fun.

When autumn comes and people stop trickling out to enjoy the waters as much, Gia finds Ernie's BrainFreeze to be lonelier than before, even though frozen yogurt is a year-round delight.

 

* * *

 

Winter comes, and Gia highly doubts that Emma will swing by.

She doesn't.

 

* * *

 

It'd been stupid to think that someone who doesn't even live in Harwood County would want to come back all the time, anyway. (They hardly knew each other, she tells herself, but it'd felt like she'd known Emma for ages over a couple of words.)

 

* * *

 

Summer comes again, and Gia is still serving frozen yogurt.

Her favorite is a low-fat, cherry berry strawberry with carob chips and no hot fudge.

It tastes like how she imagines Emma's kiss would.

 

* * *

 

One morning, somewhere between the hours of six and seven, she walks into work and is too busy tying her apron around her waist to notice that someone's already sat down at the counter.

"So, Gia, what's on the reading list this summer?"

She has a pseudo-heart attack and, then, another one when she sees Emma's brief, teasing grin as Emma glances over the back cover of Gia's copy of _The Great Gatsby._

 _You're back_ is all she can think, but she says, "What the hell are you doing here so early?"

Emma holds up a bag by her side, and Gia can see a camera peeking out from inside. "I wanted to grab some shots of the sunrise," she explains, "I've never actually gotten anything on this beach."

Behind her, the sun is starting to come up over the horizon. Gia raises an eyebrow at her, "Well, why're you over here, then? The sun's in _that_ direction."

Emma doesn't respond and simply gives Gia a soft, but knowing, smile, looking very much like she's in on some secret that Gia, unfortunately, isn't.

 

* * *

 

That day, Emma sticks around for a couple of hours, quietly watching Gia ring up strings of customers and, at one point, Emma herself for her usual. (Gia finds it telling that she had asked, "Your usual?" and Emma's brow had furrowed as she answered, "I have a usual? I've been here, like, twice.")

At some point, Emma leaves on the pretense of having something to do, but then she's back within the hour. Gia tries not to think about how many times she thought about Emma in that hour of absence.

It's only after Gia gets off shift and leaves things for Antonio to handle that she realizes that Emma missed the sunrise entirely.

 

* * *

 

The next morning, she's reading _The Great Gatsby_ during work and is interrupted as something flutters out of the pages when she turns one. Her bookmark -- the same one Emma had written on, the writing's started to fade -- is still on the counter, so Gia bends down to pick up…

A photograph.

There she is in the center -- blonde curls, black apron, yellow polo shirt -- ringing up some random beachgoer's order, her eyes focused on the cash register and not at all noticing Emma's camera.

Gia flips the photograph over and, surely enough, Emma's handwriting is on the back.

_I like this sunrise better. <3 - Emma _

She wonders how green would look on Emma and when exactly she became Jay Gatsby.

 

* * *

 

One time, Troy comes to get frozen yogurt with his friend in black -- Jake as he introduces himself -- and smirks a little bit when he catches Gia's face falling once she realizes that Emma isn't with them.

"You really like her, huh?" he asks, grinning at her between licks of his froyo.

Gia almost leans over the counter and pushes his cone into his face, but that's probably not allowed somewhere in the employee handbook that she didn't read.

"Shut up," she huffs, and Troy only laughs.

 

* * *

 

Later that week, Gia thinks about Objectivism and summer wistfulness.

She doesn't quite agree with Ayn Rand on many fronts, but Rand encourages the facing of facts, of an immutable reality.

A fact -- she likes, no, she really, _really_ likes Emma Goodall.

Another fact -- she's going to ask Emma Goodall out and go boldly where no other person has gone before. (Or, at least, where she's never gone before.)

 

* * *

 

Emma comes by close to July's end, and Gia sweeps all plans of asking her out under the rug when she sees the misery all over Emma's face.

"Hey, what's wrong?" she asks when Emma slumps down at the counter and buries her head in the crook of her elbow, blatantly hiding.

Gia crouches down to countertop level and gently puts a hand on Emma's arm. It's the first physical contact they've actually had besides touching when money or froyo is exchanged.

"Hey," she lightly shakes Emma a bit, "Would having your usual make you feel a little better?"

Emma glances up, her eyes red and puffy; the sleeve of her shirt is damp with her silent tears. Gia's heart drops like a brick down into her stomach, and her jaw clenches as a million thoughts rush through her head -- the first of which being _If someone hurt her, I'm going to punch their lights out._

"Maybe," Emma answers, quietly, dragging her hands across her face to wipe away her tears, "Sorry, I'm such a mess right now."

"Don't be," Gia reassures her, firmly, and whips up Emma's usual in record time, presenting it to her with a warm, and maybe a bit sad, smile. When Emma reaches in her pocket for her wallet, Gia shakes her head, "No, don't worry about that. It's on the house."

Emma blinks and takes the froyo cup with a small nod and sniffle, "Oh. Thanks, Gia."

They sit -- or, well, Gia stands -- in silence for a couple of minutes as Emma eats a few spoonfuls of her froyo, not looking _great_ but slightly better, her eyes regaining some of their brilliance.

Finally, Emma says, "My school has this study abroad thing in Italy, and the waitlist for it is ridiculously crazy. I signed up at the beginning of sophomore year, but I didn't think I'd get in. I even forgot about it… until this morning."

She shifts and reaches in her back pocket, pulling out an envelope and tossing it down on the counter.

Gia's stomach flips for all the wrong reasons, and she hesitantly picks up the envelope at Emma's urging, reading the letter inside.

A full school year. In Italy.

The country of dreams, where Gia's will be crushed.

"It's a beautiful place," she says, but the words taste bitter on her tongue, "You should go. It'd be _amazing_ for your portfolio."

Emma doesn't seem convinced. She stares at the countertop, her eyes downcast, and traces a pattern on the surface that Gia can't quite make out.

"Yeah, but there's no you there," Emma laments, softly, and Gia wonders how long she's been missing all the signs.

 

* * *

 

The night Emma breaks the news to her about Italy, Gia goes home and spends a good third of her savings on a plane ticket due for December.

 

* * *

 

It takes them an entire year, basically, to finally exchange phone numbers and social media accounts.

To be fair, they've only known each other for a short while as Gia always goes radio silent during the school year to focus on her work.

This time, it's different.

 

* * *

 

By the time December rolls around, they've built up a Snapchat streak in three digits.

Emma's name in her Snapchat is punctuated by a pink, sparkly heart at the end, and Gia's heart races wildly every time she sees a new notification from her favorite name.

 

* * *

 

The semester ends, and Gia is on a flight to Italy.

She lands with her Snapchat having been completely silent for over twenty hours, with Emma being under the pretense that she was traveling with her family to New Zealand.

Gia sends her vague pictures of the airport floor and her own luggage to keep up the surprise and casually asks for details of the student housing Emma's staying at.

When she makes it to her hotel, she's absolutely exhausted, but the thought of being in the same country as Emma, unsurprisingly, keeps Gia on her feet long enough to take a refreshing shower and dress herself in something nice.

Emma sends her Snapchats the whole time, and Gia manages to piece together a good enough trail to follow with Google Maps.

She's only a few shops down when Emma sends her a selfie of her eating gelato at a small cafe with the caption _Thinking of you._

Emma's pouting in the picture, and Gia screenshots it with a smile.

She sends her back a Snap of the streets of Italy, focusing, in particular, on a dark-haired girl in a denim jacket and a pink skirt, unaware of Gia's camera.

It takes Emma a full minute to turn around, and then, suddenly, Gia's arms are full of warmth and joy and _Emma._

 

* * *

 

"I can't believe--"

Emma is at a loss for words, still processing, as Gia sits down across from her.

"How-- _why_ didn't you tell me?"

Gia laughs at Emma's bewildered look and shakes her head, "That'd ruin the surprise, obviously." She tilts her head, eyes twinkling, and teases, "How's the gelato?"

Emma ducks her head, blushing, and there's that look in her eyes again -- like she knows something Gia doesn't. But, this time, Gia _does_ know.

"It's good," Emma murmurs, a small smile playing at her lips, "But there's no cute blonde ringing me up, so I think it's lacking a little." She punctuates her sentence by pointing her spoon at Gia, and, on pure impulse, Gia leans forward and eats Emma's next bite right off the utensil, laughing when Emma's eyes widen.

Emma huffs, narrowing her eyes, "Uh, _rude_ , I didn't know we were at 'sharing food' yet."

The tickling of brain freeze pokes at the edges of her skull. Gia chuckles and winks, "I mean, I _did_ cross the world for you, so I think we're way beyond sharing food, yeah?"

With a shrug, Emma pretends to think about it for a moment then nods, rolling her eyes, "Yeah, _sure_ , I guess it's okay." Her free hand traces something on the table's surface, and Gia finally recognizes the pattern -- _her_ name.

She thinks about Objectivism and pursuing happiness, a rich boy and a girl with a father on the run, Gatsby and his endless pursuit, and a war that she doesn't fight in this world.

Gia feels bold, carefree, like she always has. Reaching across the table, she places her hand over Emma's and says, fully alive and in love, "There's something else I wanna share with you, if you'll have it."

Emma keeps her gaze for a long moment then nods, waiting and trusting, "Yeah, okay."

When they kiss, the taste of strawberry is overwhelmingly sweet in her mouth -- like Emma, Emma, _Emma._

 

~

 

_With only bricks to break my fall_

_For you, I'd risk it all_

**Author's Note:**

> title from Risk It All - The Vamps


End file.
